MEMORIAM (2 page)

“You got it?” Sam asked. I nodded over my shoulder.

“Give me a second.” I fired three more times at the same spot. I then aimed the klave a foot above the four needles lodged in the concrete and fired again. Several more times I did this until a small stepping ladder of sorts was designed, leading to the top of the wall.

“Be careful, Vi,” Sam said.

“I will.” My fingers burned as I gripped the needles over my head, resting my right foot on the first set of needles I shot. “They’re holding,” I panted.

“You need to hurry,” Teb said. I hoisted myself onto the next set of needles, taking deep breaths as my heart raced. The sky grew lighter. Dawn was coming. I gripped the last needle and threw myself on top of the ledge and looked back down, watching as James was hoisted onto Teb’s shoulders. He was too small to reach the needles I had placed in the concrete so I pulled the small section of rope I had managed to steal out of my pocket and tossed it down.

“Okay, James. Hold onto the rope, okay? Don’t let go.”

Teb looped the rope around James’ chest and tied it, signaling me when he finished. I began to hoist James up, gasping as my foot wavered and slid.

“Shit.” I grabbed the ledge, swearing again under my breath.

“You okay, Vi?” Sam’s voice called out.

“Yeah.” Tears sprang to my eyes. My body was rushing itself, telling me I was running out of time. “You can do this,” I said to myself. James was almost at the top.

“My arms hurt.”

“Just a few more seconds. Hold on, James. Don’t let go.”

I bent low while holding the rope back with my other arm. “Grab my hand, James.”

His small fingers reached up, scrambling for mine. I grasped his wrist and pulled him up, balancing myself as he fell into my arms.

“Are you okay?”

James nodded. The sky was a slight pink now. Bits of yellow dotted the trees. All around I could see the forest start to grow, spreading over rolling hills and past those hills, sprawling mountains. I took a deep breath in, tasting fresh pine and sea salt on my tongue.

“Why are you smiling?” James asked.

“Do you smell that? That’s the ocean and the trees. It’s beautiful.” It was like a new rush of energy surged through me. My confidence grew and my anxiety lessened.

I was working my way down now. During my second set of needles I heard yelling. I looked around frantically for skryers. I scrambled back up the wall and looked over the ledge. Up past the main entrance of the dome I saw them, three skryers running towards us. “Sam!” I called out, panic flooding my airways.

“Sam, go!” Teb yelled, waving for Sam to climb up. James needed to start climbing down while I helped Sam. I stuffed the klave in my back pocket and tightened the rope around James’ chest, my hands shaking. Everything felt frozen. Screams across the empty courtyard, Teb cursing and Sam panting, his shadow moving up the wall. I lowered James down the other side of the wall, ignoring the sweat that ran down my nose. I let go of the rope when James neared the bottom and watched as he hit the ground with a soft thud then scrambled to his feet. I turned back to Sam who was halfway up.

“Come on, Sam,” I mumbled. “Please. Please make it.”

Sam was nearing the top. He groaned as he reached up for the last set of needles. “Sam,” I whispered, “you can do it. You’re almost there.”

He smiled up at me. “Nothing like some skryers to get your blood pumping, huh?”

I smiled through my tears, fighting back sobs. He stretched out his arm and I clutched it.

A faint whistle reached my eardrums and I screamed, Sam’s hand slipping out of mine. “No, goddammit!” I screamed. “SAM!” He’d been shot by a klave.

Sam was lying on his stomach, his back to me. I noticed Teb on the ground a few feet from Sam. A small needle from a klave was lodged in his neck. Teb was gone.

“Sam!” I screamed. “Can you hear me?”

He rolled over. Even through the faint light I could see his piercing blue eyes. “Vi, run.” His voice wobbled. I shook my head. He slammed his fist into the ground.

“Dammit Vi, you get out of here!”

“I can’t.” I sniffed. “I won’t leave you.”

“I love you,” he gasped, clutching his neck. Tears streamed down my face.

“I love you, too.” My tears blinded me as I turned, leaping from the wall. I hit the ground with a loud crunch, my ankle buckling under my weight.

The sky was was bright now, lighting the way to the forest line. Behind us I heard more yelling.

“Where’s Sam?” James asked. I ignored him and grabbed his hand, limping towards the forest. My eyes felt swollen and puffy and it was hard to see from the constant stream of tears running down my face.

“Keep running, James. Come on,” I said.

“You’re limping. You hurt your ankle, didn’t you?”

“Yes. We need to keep going, though. We can’t stop now.”

There were shouts behind us. The paralyzing truth that I would never make it out alive hit me. Sam was dead and I was as good as dead, too. James was the only one left. I fell on my knees, pain shooting up my calf.

I groaned. “Latch on around my neck. Wrap your legs around my waist.”

The burning sensation in my ankle was too much. I started crawling as fast as I could, dragging my broken ankle through the grass as I listened for hunters. When we reached the tall grass by the edge of the forest I pulled James off and grabbed his face. “I need you to run.”

James shook his head. “Not without you.”

“You need to run and leave me here. You can’t come back for me. Not for anyone. You need to leave.”

James started to cry. “You promised you’d never leave me.”

“I-I know,” I stuttered. “But I’ll come for you. We need to split up first, okay? Do you remember Hide-and-Seek? The game Mother taught you?”

James nodded.

“We are going to play that. I need you to run and hide. Do you know Jaxton? The town down South on The Rim? Go there and wait for me. There are people who will help me find you. Can you do that?”

“Do you promise you’ll come and find me?” James asked.

“Cross my heart.” I kissed his forehead.  “I love you. Don’t you ever forget that.” I ran a hand through his hair. A pang shot through me and I bit the inside of my cheek. “Go on. Don’t come back. I will come and find you.”

James threw his arms around my neck and buried his face in my shoulder. I didn’t want to let go. Eight years ago when my mother decided she wanted a second child, the government rejected her request. They said her body was too old to carry another child and thought it best to let someone else carry the child for her. She refused and fought back. Nine months later she had James, a little miracle. Our age gap was so large that he could have been my child, but as James grew, so did my love for him. I felt sick letting him go.

His little arms pulled back from my neck and he took off running through the grass, the slithering sound dissolving as he vanished. I reached in my back pocket for the klave but it wasn’t there. It must have fallen out while I was crawling. I took a deep breath, steadying my heartbeat.
Stay calm, Vi. You’ll be okay.

I glanced around the meadow. That’s when I saw her, a hunter standing at the edge of the grass field, watching me. I wondered if she saw James run.
Please say she didn’t see James. Please God.
I managed to get to my feet. The woman raised her gun and pointed at me. All I could think was
run.
I stepped over a log and ducked as I heard the gun fire, then picked up the pace, clenching my jaw with every step. I reached the tree line and sidestepped a low hanging branch, keeping an eye out for James. There was another loud
BANG
and I grimaced, my head spinning.

I stopped running. My body couldn’t stand straight anymore; the world was tilting right and hunters were all around me, staring at me sideways. One came closer and I noticed the glint of a knife, then a sharp pain in my side. All sound vanished. Someone was screaming…was it me? Everything was muffled.

“Trent will do it.”

I smelled rust. I coughed, spraying the man in front of me with blood. His hand struck my face, sending a burning sensation through my cheek. A numb feeling tugged at my chest near my lungs. My heart felt like it was being compressed into glass, heated then beaten.

I shot my fist out, hitting a mouth, then swinging again and hitting the man’s stomach. It was hard to see. I swung again and heard the man grunt. Something hard hit my stomach and I fell on my back.

“We don’t need to kill her.”

“She doesn’t deserve to live,” the man who hit me said. My vision cleared and I noticed the large scar on his face. The man on my right who was defending me had a large build and dark furrowed eyebrows.

“She does just as much as we do.” Why was this man defending me?

“She won’t survive!” the man with the scar argued.

“Severin, listen to Trent.” There was another voice speaking.

“Don’t tell me what to do, old man! We don’t have the option of choosing. We kill. Do it now, Trent.”

“No.”

This,
I thought to myself,
is what it feels like to die.
Inside my heart was attacking my body and my lungs were collapsing. It worsened when Sam’s face materialized in my mind. The way he looked at me before I jumped the wall made me go cold. Guilt washed over me. I had left him there to die.

People claim that the worst pain in the world isn’t dying, but watching someone you love die. Sam’s limp body replayed itself in my head and I covered my trembling mouth.
I’m sorry.

Incomparable loss – of Sam, and James, and the future I would never have with them – hit me. I sobbed, my shoulders shaking.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”

My jumpsuit was soaked through with blood.

“Let’s take her back. She might make it,” the man with the large build said.

 “She’s lost too much blood.”

“I think that if you keep standing here debating it then she will die regardless of what you want.” A taller woman with jet black hair came into focus. I blinked several times and counted the hunters surrounding me. There were five.

“Don’t take me back,” I said. The idea of going back into the base was worse than death at this point. I wouldn’t live without Sam.

“Let me die,” I croaked. Nothing focused anymore. I breathed maniacally. My hearing started to fade again. The forest was silent. Then I heard it: a song playing in my ear, growing louder and louder. My eyes welled up and my heart pumped faster. The song was blaring in my ears now. I shut my eyes and saw Sam.

It wasn’t the Sam I knew now, though. It was the Sam I knew from two years ago when I first met him. His face was younger. We were dancing, swaying back and forth. He began to hum. It was the first time he told me he loved me. We were alone in his room and it was late.

I couldn’t control my sobs. It felt like I was underwater. Sam’s voice kept humming. “Baby, I wrote you in a song…” He pulled me close and rested his mouth next to my ear. I felt the corners of his mouth tickle my neck. “…to tell you,” he breathed in my ear, humming softly, the subtle purr of his chest vibrating against mine, “…I love you.” Our hearts beat as one, and when he gazed into my eyes I knew I was in love with him, too.

I was losing it. I was leaving, dying. My heartbeat pounded in my ears until the song faded and my breath slowed down to almost nothing. Then everything went black.

Two weeks later.

CHAPTER ONE

“Today is her last round of treatments.”

“Mm.”

Bronte’s eyes flashed at Sam from under her curtain of satin red hair. He noticed it but said nothing. Bronte had been prying where she did not belong. She had been asking about Violet for the past week, but Sam kept quiet. What happened that morning out by the wall would be forever in his memory. After he was shot by a skryer he was paralyzed. Following hours of surgery, the klave in Sam’s shoulder was removed and his body freed of poison. Some people called it a blessing that the Head chose to spare Sam’s life, but Sam was not convinced. From what he could tell, his life had turned into a personal hell.

When Sam had first seen Violet rolled into the healing center on a stretcher he was stunned. A crisp white sheet, fresh from the laundry division, covered her body. Sam had expected her to be dead when he pulled back the sheet but she still had a heartbeat. It was almost gone, but not yet.

“What’s the hold up?” one of the hunters had snapped. Sam had struggled to pull his attention away from Violet’s broken body to Trent.

“Well?”

“Nothing.” Sam looked back down at Violet. “Nothing.”

Sam knew Trent was one of the extreme hunters but had known no more than that. It was pointless to ask Trent about what had happened to Violet; everything that happened amongst the hunters never left their mouths. They were as mysterious as the Head who took over Rinfero.

Sam kept hoping Vi would wake up and see that he was still alive, but she didn’t. After an hour and a half of silence she was wheeled away, and he hadn’t seen her since. He’d heard things from Bronte or the other healers about her having a ‘disobedience’ injury, but he did not know what they meant by that. Most of the healers who talked about disobedience injuries were more experienced than him and dealt with a selective group of patients.

“Pately!”

“Yeah?” Sam turned around. Plantarch, a regular who came in to deal with disobedience injuries, was striding down the isle of the healing center, a memory disc in his hand.

“I hear you had a….slip-up…of sorts last week.”

“I didn’t know the base wanted news like that spread around,” Sam replied, staring intentionally at the wall behind Plantarch.

“Well all they’ve said is they have a surprise to remind you never to do it again. Keep in mind I’m only the messenger.” Plantarch turned around and waved his hand. A stretcher rolled in, carrying a figure Sam knew all too well. His heart pounded. Plantarch stepped over next to Sam. “Apparently they were waiting for the right punishment.” A healer pulled the sheet back and there on the stretcher was Violet. Her skin was blotchy and dark green circles lay under her eyes. Her body looked crippled and broken.